pictures, skilfully and laboriously painted; but inspiration is absent from them all. There is not one great or original idea among them; they have either been wrought on the academical track, or they follow fashion-the modern academy. Amongst the pictures most admired in Paris are those of De Nittos, which very faithfully represent scenes of London life; and of Pasini, who brings before us Oriental life. The French have adopted these two painters, and look on them already as their own; which is very complimentary, no doubt, and proves with what facility our artists are able to conform to the tastes of other nations. But one would rather have them study to represent, with all the delicacy of which they are capable, our own natural tastes, our own rural life, and our own characteristics. In the pictures sent by Italy to the Paris Exhibition the spirit of Italy is little felt. This is the criticism of the French themselves, and I think it well deserved, although Domenic Induno and some others have sent pictures which make us the more desire that the rule should have had many similar exceptions.

It may seem to some to augur little love of country to confess that the department of Italian art at the Paris Exhibition is not this time a very brilliant one. But I am persuaded that Italy had better things to send there (and of this Bellucci's picture is a luminous proof), and our taste is not yet so perverted as to allow us to admire the mediocre productions that were exhibited as the only representatives of the artistic worth of Italy. Italian art applied to furniture and mosaics has no rival, and will always attest the facility with which the Italian mind can adopt different attitudes. But pure art as such has not yet made its way securely, it has not yet emerged from churches and academies, not yet resolutely entered the path of modern society in order to represent it and draw a new ideal thence. Let us hope that some artist of genius will arise to boldly carry art into a wider and more human sphere, where it will acquire a new power, for at present it no longer responds to the needs of antique life, neither does it yet respond to those of modern. This seems to me the principal reason of our apparent decadence in painting : the Italian artist lives too much alone, he knows too little the world for which he works, or the movement of current ideas. He is too ignorant, works too mechanically, does not think enough about his art. The days are past of the Raphaelles, the Michael Angelos, the Leonardos, masters of several arts at once. The court of Lorenzo the Magnificent no longer exists, where artists and men of letters interchanged ideas. In our age everything is specialized, and particular machines invented for everything. Once the artist prepared his own colours and chalk, now all labour is divided. This division of labour has occasioned a great loss of intelligence. The artist must re-enter life, that life which he is to represent and is bound to ennoble by his works. But in order to ennoble, one must acquire a certain nobility oneself, and no true nobility is possible without some profound faith that sustains the artist, and I doubt whether the best way of ennobling our youths is recommending them to admire and imitate Voltaire. Voltaire's centenary gave occasion in Italy for a century of eulogistic articles, a solemn representation of "Zaire" in the Theatre Apollo in Rome, by the great actor, Tommaso Salvini, and the admired actress, Virginia Marini, for an apotheosis of him by Paulo Ferrari, for several demonstrations by students, several publications, amongst others that of a version of the " Pucelle d'Orléans," hitherto unpublished, written by Vincenzo Monti in irregular Italian verse, and now being brought out in Leghorn by the publisher, Francisco Vigo. All this might lead to the belief that Voltaire is popular in Italy; but, on the contrary, the artificial excitement we speak of is purely literary. In Italy, thanks to the liberty that we enjoy, such demonstrations can be carried on more easily and completely than in France. But then with us they have no weight with the people, who are not very sure who Voltaire was, although Voltaire had many relations with the illustrious Italians of his day, spoke and wrote our language, and evinced on several occasions a love for Italy, and although the clergy, with their invectives against the impiety of Voltaire

and Rousseau, have frequently revived the name. But though the name of Voltaire, noisily proclaimed and approved, may produce no serious effect upon the people, we may well fear the impression made upon the youths who study him, by their admiration of this author. What he is admired and honoured for is perhaps the most pernicious aspect of his genius. If stress were laid on the greatness of Voltaire as a prose writer, I think it would be difficult to object; and it would be well to lead students to consider the most positive merit and best side of this great author. But what leads to his glorification is his scepticism. Now on a soil by nature so sceptical already, admiration of this sort of sceptic is by no means the most pressing want. The scepticism of Voltaire is in part dependent on great mobility, inconstancy, and perfidy of character. He could laugh at everything, because he took nothing seriously; and he took nothing seriously, because his affections were never strongly engaged. He felt nothing obligatory, all transactions and transitions whatever were possible to him, from the worship of liberty to that of despotism, from servility to independence, because in all things he looked exclusively at his own interest, or his own pleasure, at the conflict between a man of intellect and des dupes, in which the former was ever to triumph! One may admire the genius of Voltaire as a wonderful, gigantic caprice of nature; but woe to whoever loves the man, or tries to imitate his type. It leads in literature to Candide and the Pucelle, and to much exaggerated eulogy; leads in politics, on one side, to paying court to Frederick of Prussia and Catharine of Russia, and to the coup d'état; on the other side, to '93 and regicide. In the system of Voltaire all opinions and all contradictions find a place, because intellect alone can never be the centre of any great moral unity.

For this, character is required. This conviction it is that has led the Lombard Institute to propose the following theme to the competitors for a literary prize given by Signor Ravezza:-"The importance in the education of Italians of the formation of character, as the foundation of public spirit, perfect veracity, and consistent action; guiding principles and practical methods for obtaining the same." The prize was taken by a young Florentine, educated in the Catholic School of Augusto Conti, a chaste writer, who lays down religion as an essential basis of character. Together with this prize essay of Signor Augusto Alfani, to whom we already owe a careful monograph on Orazio Rucellai, we may mention another work, which, though doubtless less well written, is broader in scope, by a man of mature age, who has had time through life's vicissitudes to gain a character of his own. This last book was published in Milan by Luigi Perola, and is entitled, "The Nation and the Family: A Study of Character," by Antonio Reale. The books of Samuel Smiles have led to works of the kind in Italy, and have set a fashion, a good fashion, which may last one hopes till such books are no longer needed. They are much needed at present. Massimo d'Azeglio, a short time before his death, gave memorable advice. "Now that Italy is made," said he, "let us occupy ourselves with forming Italians."

But this reformation must begin with ourselves, with each of us who reads. Character is almost always ill-defined, and hence Signor Reale refrains from a definition which would run a risk of falling short of perfection; but we all know and feel what sort of thing character is-the very lever of public and private morality. If it be difficult to define character, it is easy to distinguish between the possession and the want of it: to observe what elements contribute to its formation and what evils arise from its absence, and to foster by the study of those elements its growth in ourselves and others. This Signor Reale has attempted, giving Italians the benefit of his own observation. But the theme is new and vast, and hence he often diverges and becomes unnecessarily prolix. His book is full of good things, but cannot be called a good book. However, it is useful. Italians may find in it good advice and some wellchosen illustrations; foreigners may gain some knowledge of Italian character

and capabilities of improvement; but the defects of style that pervade the book will damage its effect. The titles of several chapters promise well, but their contents are poor and dry, without charm or vivacity. The author always has good aims, but on some of these it was superfluous to dwell. For instance, long and emphatic recommendations to love of country are of little use. Italians have not hitherto been lacking in words wherewith to magnify Italy, but words are not what we want to strengthen patriotism, rather we need examples taken from our own history, from the lives of our heroes, our fathers; and in Reale's book these are few and they lack vividness. Yet no civil and literary history offers nobler biographical material than that of Italy in our century. One might almost say such material is inexhaustible. With merely his own personal recollections, Signor Ferdinando Bosio, Piedmontese poet and Central Director of Elementary Education-a man who never played an important part in public life, yet is not insignificant either, because of his private relations with the political friends of Rattazzi-has produced a whole volume of biographical sketches, partial, incomplete, but always interesting, because full of characteristic anecdotes of certain Piedmontese, as well as of other Italians who, during exile, took refuge in Piedmont. These "Ricordi Personali" of Signor Bosio, treat of Angelo Brofferio, eloquent advocate, graceful poet in the Piedmontese dialect, and independent journalist at a time when independence might cost a man his liberty if not his head; Francesco dall' Ongaro, ex-priest and charming Venetian poet, true patriot, acute critic, author of the drama "Il Fornaretto," and professor of dramatic literature died five years ago at Naples; Filippo de Boni, ex-monk, vigorous critic, ardent patriot, virulent journalist, daring freethinker-died in poverty at Florence in 1870; Francesco Domenico Guerazzi of Leghorn, distinguished romancist, dictator of Tuscany, a powerful Michelangelic nature, rough and unequal; Alessandro Tanavia, a much-cultured littérateur from Dalmatia, the elegant translator of Pliny's letters, for many years the popular and admired Professor of Literature at Turin; Antonio Peretti of Modena, graceful poet, noble and energetic patriot, who died holding a humble post indeed, but revered and fondly loved, in Ivrea, a small town of Piedmont; Urbano Rattazzi of Alessandria, a celebrated advocate, who later became the head of a great political party, at once democratic and constitutional; Amedeo Ravina, author of the spirited "Canti Italici" (which, in 1821, led to sentence of death by default and to a long exile), eccentric and most original deputy of Alba, his birthplace; Ricardo Sineo, orator of the democratic party in the Piedmontese Parliament.

It may seem to some that too much of the person of the biographer is mixed up with these biographies; but the very title that the author gives to his book renders this criticism irrelevant. After all, the person of the biographer is not indifferent to us, and his own confession may show us some curious sides of Italian life, some interesting pages of our literary history. Bosio often leads us back to the years in which he was a student in Piedmont, and to his early political and literary struggles. In talking of himself he recalls a period of our contemporary history, the record of which grows weaker as the actors in it drop off. And this is to be regretted, because it was a noble history. I do not very well know what future biographers will have to write about the youths of our day. Their tendencies are not at all poetical. Few-not many-are earnest students, impatient to become or rather to seem-men of weight; they would be ashamed to have attributed to them any sentiment or imagination whatever. They despise verses, care not for art, find athletic sports beneath them; and before creating anything, devote themselves to spiteful criticism. Other young men pursue office or wealth; anything, that does not immediately lead to what they call practical results, fails to interest them. At the age of twenty they are already dreaming of being deputies, or they are in a hurry to repose in a canonry. They are indifferent to all that does not

help them on to this. Others, again, do love verses, but what verses? Verses in which they can indulge in imagination those gross instincts that cannot find satisfaction in manners and customs less corrupt than they would wish. They say that they wish to paint the real, and that if the real were not ugly, they would not represent it so. But here there is a double fallacy: first of all, they represent this real not as ugly but as beautiful, and caress it with all manner of loose flatteries; and secondly, it is not true that this real does exist outside of houses of bad character, where they perhaps are in the habit of studying it. It is evident that this materialistic tendency of our poetical youth must rouse the indignation of honest men and true poets, and one of these last has not been able to refrain from a lofty Grido, as he himself entitles a series of satirical sonnets against the modern infamous tendency of our poetry. The author of this Cry is a most charming Venetian poet, a learned teacher, a friend of Alessandro Manzoni, a noble, sympathetic, and upright character: Professor Giovanni Rizzi, who thinks that the time has come to raise a barrier to check this muddy stream, and resolutely sets his face against it. His satirical sonnets to Maiale and Pietro Aretino and their worshippers at once found great favour in Italy; Professor Vischer of Stuttgart translated them into German, and published them in the Uber Land und Meer. Some other Italian writers have echoed this holy cry, heedless of the low insults hurled at them by the champions of the new poetry. The battle is being vigorously carried on, and it comforts me to see enter the ranks a powerful Lombard genius, Giuseppe Guerzoni, professor of Italian literature in the University of Padua, to lend a strong hand to Rizzi. He has taken occasion in a late publication of his, "Il Primo Rinascimento," to flagellate the materialistic, epicurean, and ignoble tendencies of our most recent Italian literature. His conclusions, as well as his courageous preface, cannot give pleasure to certain critics, who have praised and promoted this new literature; and hence Guerzoni's book was shamefully treated by them. True Guerzoni is not actually an erudite man; he deals with the history of literature on a large scale, not a small, hence certain minutiæ, certain small discoveries, generally insignificant, which the erudite pique themselves upon, are ignored by him; as for instance, that Signor Fouini is dead, that the Putaffio is no longer attributed to Brunello Latini, and other trivialities that can noways affect the substance of his criticism of the middle ages, from which he dates our true renaissance; if one can speak of a renaissance with regard to a people conscious of never having been dead. Professor Guerzoni has little value for the Cinque Cento, corrupt and corrupting as it was; but on the other hand much for the middle ages as true, original, still holding close to nature, and genial in tendency. In a conversation with Guerzoni, Professor Giorgia Politio observed, "The Cinque Cento has given branches and leaves to the tree of our life, but the vital sap derives from the middle ages. And they are the strongest who have most of this sap. Look at England, what nation has more of middle-age character, and which is more vigorous and hence more civilized? It was in the middle ages that there awoke that sense of individuality which is the most powerful lever of progress and culture." Professor Guerzoni has conceived and executed his theme in a novel fashion, he has thought it out with his head and written it with his generous heart, and hence, spite of a few errors easily removable by a stroke of the pen, one can read it from beginning to end with delight and profit. It is eloquent and sympathetic, it stirs thought and feeling. Such books can never be useless, but in the present day they are essential, and I am persuaded that English readers who read a translation of it—a few superfluous quotations omitted-would agree with me in esteeming an author who has the courage of his opinions, thinks and feels nobly, and opens out new horizons. His temperament does not allow him to be very calm in the enunciation of his ideas; sometimes he exceeds; phrases too highly coloured soon pass into hyperbole, and hyperbole always somewhat distorts truth. But the fundamental idea of the book appears to me correct, and much of the special

thinking new. I believe that with a little patience Signor Guerzoni might easily acquire the minute information which his critics possess; while, let them strive as they may, they will never be able to give wings to their intellect, destined for ever to drag itself along the ground, and incapable of rising into a sphere in any degree ideal.

ANGELO DE GUBERNATIS.

TH

II.

IN RUSSIA.

ST. PETERSBURG, July 10th, 1878.

HE warlike period is happily at an end, and though ultra-patriots would like Russia to resort again to the sword, and to gather fresh laurels on new fields of battle, every reasonable man ought to rejoice that a pacific solution has been attained. The war has left so many wounds to be healed, and such a number of neglected tasks to be done, that our statesmen will have no leisure to deplore the concessions made for peace, and publicists may find in the discussion of home questions an ample compensation for the fertile theme of patriotism, which they have rather abused lately.

Financial difficulties are now in the foreground, and if artless and innocent minds go on believing that the depreciation of our paper money will be cured at once by the termination of the war, such a delusion is not to be entertained by better informed people. They know that the gradual sinking of our rouble is only partly caused by the distrust with which States at war generally inspire foreigners, and that the chief ground lies in the over-issue of these monetary symbols. The amount of paper roubles in currency has been increased during one single year by three hundred and thirty-two millions, so that it now actually surpasses a thousand millions. If we consider that the load bequeathed by the Crimean war has not been cleared away during a quarter of a century of peace, and that the new issues have been added to the old burden, we may readily conceive how difficult it will be to get rid of it, or eveu to reduce it now. To issue paper money is certainly the worst expedient that can be employed, and it is to be supposed that the Finance Minister knew this as well as his critics. If he resorted to it notwithstanding all its bad consequences, he probably saw no other way of getting out of his difficulties. Opponents pretend that there was no absolute need for it, and that foreign or national loans would easily have supplied the funds required; but in such cases, it is easier to censure than to act, and Reutern may at least plead as an excuse the fact of his having always been against the war. It is known that he presented a memorandum to the Emperor in favour of peace, which he advocated with all his might. When his opinion was disregarded, he might certainly have resigned his post, and that is what a Minister in any other European country would have done; but in Russia high functionaries do not regard their offices from such a point of view. Being appointed by the Czar, they serve him, and as long as he is satisfied with their services, they do not resent a difference of view between their sovereign and themselves. Change of Ministers is very rarely, or rather never, the result of political disagreements; the chief causes are death, serious illness requiring rest, or the monarch's personal displeasure; and if one hears sometimes that a Minister is going to resign because his proposals are not accepted by the Emperor, those threats seldom go beyond words, and his Majesty has only to express his desire to keep the stubborn functionary to see his wish fulfilled.

In such circumstances, Reutern cannot incur reproach for not having given up his portfolio at the declaration of war, since it would not be fair to exact from him